Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-09-30

only desirable stock and secure concert
of action on the part of his fellow> toilers in
the orchard and vineyard. The result will
rebound to the credit and pecuniary benefit
of not only the grower, but as well to the
State in the full protection of an industry
which is now assuming gigantic and i'm
portant proportions.
VIEWS OF DIRECTOR wEINsToCK.
H Weinstock, Director in the Califor-
mia Fruit Union, and member of the Ex-
ecutive Committee, upon being questioned
upon the years work, said:
For the first time the attempt was this
year made to market our fruits in large
quantities in Atlantic seaboard cities. And
while on the whole the results are good, it
has been made clearlthat much has to be
learned at bo:h ends of the field before the
highest result can be attained.
The two difficulties that were encoun-
tered, and that had their influence on the
results, were: First, lack of experience
in knowing just what fruits to send, and
when to send them; secondly, lack of
prompt and efficient through railroad serv-
ice.
The first difficulty will be remedied with
time, and the second must be overcome by
persistent effort on the part of growers and
shippers. The railroad service rendered by
the Southern Pacific Railroad from Sacra-
mento to Ogden has been first-cass, but
beyond Ogden the service was very unre-
liable, it being the exception where cars
reached their destination in the far Eastern
cities ON time.
AS rule the fruit arrived all the way
from three or four hours to day behind
time. This is serious in the case of perish
able fruits under any circumstances, but it
becomes doubly serious when fruits are
sold by public auction. The buyers who
assemble at a stated hour, ready and
anxious to buy, leave disappointed if not
to say dlgusted, when the announcement
is made, that owing TO delay in transit
the sale must be postponed.
Wien this happens repeatedly the buy
ers lose all confidence ia the advertise d
hour OF sale and hesitate to come when a
sale is announced. The injury thus in
fiicted on California fruit growers and ship
pers by careless or indifferent railroad
management is incalculable.
AS to whether this serious evil is to con-
dnue other seasons will depend upon the
amount of pressure that the Pacific rail-
roads and the California growers and ship
pers can bring to bear upon the Eastern
transportation companies. Few can re-
allze the great significance to California of
having our green products promptly land
ed in the great cities of the East 1t means
really the success or failure of green fruit
shipments, and little need be said as to how
much the future of our State will be in
tluenced by such failure or success.
Concerning the labors of the California
Fruit Union it may be said that il has this
season accomplished two very important
things. First, it has sent beyond Chicago
over one hundred carloads of green fruit,
| in addition to what was forwarded to. the
Atlantic seaboard through other channels.
1t is claimed that the quantity of California
fruit sent east of Chicago, through channels
other than the Fruit Union, was equal to
that of last year. If this be so, then the
hundred or more carloads sent by the
Union was, so to speak, so much additional
market gained. Had these hundred car
| loads been dumped, as last year, in the CITY
of Chicago, they would not only have de-
| moralized themselves in the way of prices,
| but they would also have demoralized the
| prices on all the fruit sent to Chicago for
| the season, and the results. as whole,
| would have been the most disastrous ever
| experienced by the growers and shippers of
| California.
| The second important point accom-
plished by the Union was in regulating
| the distribution of fruits in all the cities
| east Of the Missouri. The distribution
| might have been still better regulated had
| all the shippers joined the Union. But
| even as it was, great good was accom-
| plished by controlling the markets and
| avoiding as far as possible the fruit from
| coming into competition with itself. Had
this not been done poor prices would this
year again have ruled, where good prices
were obtained, and much worse prices
| would have been received where low
l Id